


Waters Rise

by ihighlydoubtthat



Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017) RPF
Genre: Angst, Hurt, M/M, emo as fuck, lovesick Armie, post tour depression
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2019-03-29 02:26:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13917414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ihighlydoubtthat/pseuds/ihighlydoubtthat
Summary: Armie struggles with his unrelenting feelings towards Timmy in the the aftermath of their promo tour.I wrote this last night when I was heartbroken about the boys not going to Japan and it's mostly just Armie being sad because lovesick Armie is my favourite. I'm not a writer so please excuse any mistakes.Title taken from the song Surrender by Natalie Taylor.





	Waters Rise

There was nothing before or after him. Nothing in the world that existed outside of his overloaded brain that didn't remind him of him or echo the memories he tried to suppress. 

If only for a second, he wanted quiet. He wanted silence to wash away all the hurt, all the feelings that pushed at the confines of his body from the inside out- that poked and scratched and tore him apart every moment of every day. He wanted to stop the world and sleep for as long as it took to suffocate the need to think about, dream about,  _worship_ , this boy. 

He wished he'd never met him, that he'd never taken the job. That Luca had never considered him for the part and that his life could have carried on without feeling the fire of want so badly that he couldn't sleep, or eat or breathe until he'd nearly burned himself to death in it.

But for all the anger that raged within, there was satisfaction in knowing that if he hadn't been Oliver, this entire segment of Timmy's existence would be missing also. He knew that the random luck bestowed on them by the universe was meant for their unique tandem alone The total eclipse of those months in Italy, where the planets had aligned and shielded their little world under a starry blanket, was a gift only for them and would never have materialised for just any pairing.

At least that's what Armie told himself as he lay by the pool, one foot dangling in the cool water, glass of Scotch by his side. Everything he was feeling and had been feeling since the second he met Timmy was bubbling under the surface on this crisp September night, fueled by too much liquor which in turn had been prompted by a single text message that lit up his phone an hour earlier. 

_I remember everything._

His thoughts flittered instantly between wanting the kid dead and wanting to abandon life as he knew it and get on the next plane to New York. Without answering his message, he'd just arrive at Timmy's apartment with a backpack and two one-way tickets to Italy in an attempt to rewind time so he'd never have to think about the consequences of his skewed reality again. 

 Armie sat up and sipped from his glass, sinking his other foot into the water. The coolness relaxed him for a moment and brought some focus back. He considered that a grown man sitting at the edge of a pool in the middle of the night trying to drown his sorrows about the lost love of a 20-something year old boy while tears slowly inched their way down his cheeks, was probably not a good look. But it didn't stop him from crying, shaking, stifling the scream that had been welling inside for so long he'd become accustomed to it, like the ever present awareness of an immobile prosthetic limb. He was grateful Liz had taken the kids to her parents for the weekend. He was grateful that she saw he needed some space although he didn't want to know if she fully understood the reason why. 

_I remember everything._

_How fucking dare he._  It had been months. Not that it changed anything whatsoever- it may as well have been the first day that he woke up and realised that tour was over and he had no reason to see Timmy anywhere near as often. It may as well be the very second his heart shattered when Liz put her foot down and told him not to go to Japan because he'd been 'wrapped up in the film for so long that he felt like a different person' and if he didn't let it go, she wouldn't know what to do because she missed her husband.

He  _was_ a different person, and had been from the second he'd barged into Timmy's piano lesson and seen beauty unlike anything he'd ever known. He could never tell her that. Instead he would save his emotional outbursts for behind the closed doors of hotel rooms, for punishing himself under scorching water in too-hot showers, for text messages 200 words long which he would then delete without ever sending them to their intended recipient. 

What happens in Crema, stays in Crema. That had been the parting decision when filming wrapped. Timmy seemed to have a far easier time accepting that than he did, even though Armie understood that it was the best decision for everyone. The tour had been as soul destroying as it had been one of the best experiences of his life- but he knew the latter was down to the sheer amount of time he got to spend with Timmy out in the real world and that stoking the fire would ultimately lead to combustion. Which is what was happening right now. 

He set his glass, the third Scotch of the evening, down at his side and picked up his phone. Reread the message for the twentieth time. Put the phone down. Ran his hands through his hair. Picked it up again and began to type.

 

~~_Timmy._ ~~

_~~I remember every-~~  _

~~_You're making things very difficu-_ ~~

 

Before he could muster anything sensible or solid that adequately conveyed some emotion as much as it seemed carefree, a text appeared within the message trail.

 

_T: What are you typing, an essay?_

 

Armie closed his eyes and laughed softly. Timmy must have been staring at the text he'd sent when Armie was drafting messages, and gotten impatient. He was always so impatient. 

 

_A: Hey, T_

 

He hit send without thinking too much. That was going to be his plan of action going forward, he'd decided. It felt reckless going into this conversation with Timmy now, feeling the way he felt, drinking as much as he had, but he was doing it anyway because crying by a poolside in vain was ridiculous, and while he couldn't decide what to do with his feelings for the kid, he sure didn't want to lose him as a friend by ignoring the first text he'd received in weeks.

 

_T: I'm sorry about my text before_

_T: I shouldn't have sent that_

_T: I was having a moment_

_T: Please ignore it_

 

 _My whole life has become 'a moment,_ ' Armie thought to himself. But just hearing from Timmy elated him. No longer did he want him dead- he only wanted him here, in his arms, with his face among the dark curls he'd missed brushing against his jaw with every photo opportunity. He wanted the long, slender fingers he'd once felt on every part of his body, intertwined with his own as they sat together in the dark.

  

_A: You ok?_

_T: Yeah man. Bit of wine, y'know. Friend's birthday._

_T: Would it be okay to call you?_

_T: Actually no it's ok_

 

Armie stared at the words for a moment, anticipating a follow up message that didn't arrive. After a couple minutes of staring at the screen, he found himself calling Timmy. With each ring he felt more nervous, and the longer the ringing went on the more he doubted himself and thought that Timmy could very well be staring at his name flashing across the screen, not wanting to actually speak to-

"Hey, man!" Armie heard the shuffling of shoes and the sound of a door sliding one way or another. "Lemme just... okay I'm outside. You okay?"

"Timmy, are _you_  okay?" Armie's heart was pounding. Timmy sounded so young when he'd been drinking. Regardless, his voice was that of a god damn angel- the only thing he ever wanted to hear when everything else in the world was too loud.

“Yeah, brother- probably too much wine though haha!” They both laughed, but Armie was aware of the nervous overlay in his own. Was Timmy speaking to him now under the influence of a bottle because he had something to say? Something of weight and merit... something similar to what Armie had been holding back from saying himself for so long, he wasn’t sure he hadn’t already said it outside of a dream?

“I miss you, man. When you coming to New York? Haha!” 

_When? Now. Right now. Yesterday. Timmy, you have no idea._

“I miss you too, buddy,” it felt good to say, even though the general tone of the conversation was more jovial chit-chat than undulating confessions of desire. “It’s good to hear from you.”

“You didn’t have to call, I know it’s late.” There hung a moment of silence in which Armie parted his lips to reply _I wanted to,_  but his brain tried to recalculate the sentence into something less desperate. Though both men were lubricated with alcohol, he knew he couldn’t risk the call collapsing into a tidal wave of previously unspoken confessions and ultimately drive a wider trench between them.

“I just wanted to make sure you’re okay, T.”

Armie thought he could hear the boy smile. He too was smiling, at the tiny gestures that danced between them in the radio silence. These silences had spoken volumes in Italy, and at every interview and press conference thereafter. Nestled in this particular quietness, all Armie could hear was the spouting torrent of  _its been too long, I wanted to hear your voice and your concern makes me feel good and every time I drink too much I think about the way you used to take care of me._  

“Me okay.”

Feeling a bullet to his chest, Armie inhaled deeply- scrunching his eyes, pressing his lips together tight. He was angry at Timmy for bringing this back after so long and the tears started to well again. They'd gotten through the aftermath of filming, the entire promotional tour and every major award ceremony without saying a word about what happened in Italy. And now Timmy was picking at a wound that Armie was trusting time alone to heal. 

“T,” he began, his voice slightly cracked. He knew this could go one of two ways. He could maintain calm concern for Timmy’s wellbeing, ignoring the script line and tell him to drink some water. Or he could give it up, take the wall down, step over the border and see what happens. Would it be too much for the kid? It wouldn’t be fair, he supposed, to burden him with his feelings. But isn’t that exactly what Timmy was doing to him now? He suddenly didn't have time to consider his options any longer.

“I think about you all the time, Armie,” Timmy’s voice quietly confessed, followed by a breathless freight train of “And I’m sorry that I’m telling you this now and I’m sorry that it’s happening at the bottom of a bottle of Pinot Noir but I didn’t realise how much I was going to miss you after tour and I do miss you, Armie. So fucking much.”

In stunned silence, Armie’s mouth fell open. When he’d called Timmy, in all honestly just to hear his voice while the gentle clutch of whiskey allowed him the courage, this is not what he'd been expecting. Despite the age in which he thought he'd needed to hear these things, he was now stricken with fear that unless he managed to steer the conversation back to safety, they may never come out the other side of it in tact. 

"I miss you too, buddy." A kind admission. Couldn't hurt. 

"We'd be in Japan right now. I'd be making you eat weird fish." Armie had to laugh. He could see it so clearly in his head- the two of them sitting in a cramped, understated cafe; Timmy poking unidentifiable sea life at Armie's closed lips with wooden chopsticks. Knees brushing, not quite accidentally, under the table the way they had done throughout tour because neither of them could let the other go completely. 

The thought brought back the same pain of needing whatever physical contact he could get with Timmy- no matter how small. In that moment, he recalled the myriad of instances that he needn't have placed a hand on Timmy's shoulder, put an arm around his waist for a photo, deliberately not moved his leg when Timmy sat beside him. Every single 'accidental' touch catapulting him back to the quiet, post-coital embraces of Italy. 

Thinking about it now, Armie could barely contain himself. The hunger that consumed him was the same familiar entity he'd carried with him for as long as they'd known each other. The same that birthed the fantasies he fed on during sleepless nights. He'd spent too long wondering how it was possible to still feel this way, and had ultimately let it reside like an incurable disease inside of him. 

"Armie? You there?"

Unaware of how long he'd been silent, Armie jolted from his daydream. "Yeah sorry, I was just thinking."  _Ask me about what. Ask me again if I won't tell you._

"About Japan?"

"Crema." It bluntly fell from his mouth. But it felt good. On the other side of a drawn out inhalation, he liberated the words  "About you, about us. About everything, Timmy."

When it came to it, the sheer relief of any sort of confession outdid any reservations Armie had about revealing too much. He was only giving as good as he got, he thought. Fuck it, if shit got too real, they could both just blame it on alcohol.  

"I'm three Scotch's down, by the way- so forgive me haha." His laugh faded into the stillness between them. "T, I've got so much I need to say to you, it actually hurts."

"Me too," Timmy sighed, overwhelming Armie who amidst his surprise was both euphoric and terrified. "I don't want to have this conversation when we've been drinking, it's too important."

Armie closed his eyes and smiled, bathing in Timmy's acknowledgement.  _Important._ It gave him validation and for a split second, hope. But as he wiped away the tear on his cheek, he realised that he couldn't remember the last time he had been quite this happy and that in itself was enough to bring him crashing to earth. The guilt churned his stomach and tightened his chest like a vice. 

  


But Armie quickly bound himself in the promise that if Timmy remembered any of this phone call in the sober light of day, and if he still wanted to have the conversation, he was going to look straight into his god damn eyes while having it. 

Timmy had cracked the dam tonight, so he better be prepared for the flood.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea if I'll do a second chapter for this *shrugs*
> 
> For more Charmie vomit, find me on [Tumblr.](https://c-u-at-midnight.tumblr.com/)


End file.
